Why Teach Art?

Art Inspires Creativity 
Think of spring season without any color, all of the flowers, and the blooming trees. What if they were gray? In my eyes that is what the world would be like without creativity. Gray. I feel like teaching art in grade school, helps students develop creativity.

"We teach art in the 21st century because the 21st century needs creative minds that can face the complexities of a multilayered reality, offer solutions, and follow through their completion and successful outcomes." (whyteachart.com)

Art helps open the door to creativity. It helps students develop a sense of individuality and express themselves.(Wochiak, and Clements 6) Art establishes a sense of individuality and expression, because each student no matter the art project will always have a unique individual twist. Art is a way of expressing your ideas and sharing them with others to create an all around colorful world.
Art Helps Students Develop a Sense of Community

 The definition of community states:

"a unified body of individuals"

Developing community through the arts is a way to help students become unified. It will help students learn and grow through one another, and help them share their creativity and ideas. In the Creation Mind Chapter 4 it says; 

"It(art) is also a function of what they(students) learn from others as they become member of a community."

Art helps students establish a sense of community, and what is learning without sharing what you know with others to help them improve. Without teaching art in the schools a lot of that sharing would have gone to waste. Art helps students express their individual ideas collectively.  In the creation mind they compare the community of learners to that of a little league team. Being a part of a community helps the students feel that their ideas are coming together to create something beautiful. Sharing ideas helps students feel comfortable around their peers making it a lot easier to share ideas and thoughts in other subjects.
Art Creates Opportunities in Other Subjects

"Art helps teachers teach abstraction. Abstraction in subjects like Math and English is a hard thing to teach. Art helps me, as a teacher, teach my students the more abstract concepts." -4th Grade Teacher Wendy Patton

As I researched this I found that what Mrs. Patton said was exactly right. In the champs report it gives the following information on art groups.

• a five-fold increase in use of if-then statements,
  scenario building following by what if questions,
  and how about prompts
• more than a two-fold increase in use of mental
  state verbs (consider, understand, etc.)
•  a doubling in the number of modal verbs
  (could, might, etc.)

Using the arts in English gives students the opportunity to describe what they have created. In math the arts can help things become more logical. In science the arts can help things feel and look more real. Think of any fake volcano that you have ever made, and then tell me how using art was not a part of it. Art is a part of life, and it is a part of learning.


References
"Why Teach Art." N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Jan 2011. <www.whyteachart.com>.
"Websters Dictionary." Community-Definition. Merriam Webster, 2011. Web. 28 Jan 2011.   <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/community?show=0&t=1296262010>.
Patton, Wendy. Intervew by Laurel Patton. Print. 28 Jan 2011.
Wochiak, Frank, and Robert Clements. Emphasis Art. 9th. 2010. 6. Print. 
"Creation Mind." What arts teach and how it shows. 93-115. Print.
 "The Impacts of the arts on learning." Champions of change. 1-114. Print.

What Is Art?

Webster's Dictionary defines art as;

  "the conscious use of skill and creative imagination especially in the production of aesthetic objects"

For me to answer the question, What is Art? I first wanted to define some of the power words in the definition. Words like conscious, and aesthetic. After analyzing the words definitions I came up with what I feel that art is. I first started with the word conscious. The Webster's Dictionary defines conscious as:

"perceiving, apprehending, or noticing with a degree of controlled thought or observation"

Consciousness is a a matter of controlled thoughts, but in the definition it says that the conscious use of skill and imagination is normally dedicated to the production of aesthetic objects. Websters dictionary defines aesthetics as:

"appreciative of, responsive to, or zealous about the beautiful; also : responsive to or appreciative of what is pleasurable to the senses"

 After reading this definition I was brought back to a question proposed in class;

"can something like a paintbrush be art?"

Originally my answer to this question was no, I did not understand that something that had such a practical use could be art.However, after studying the definition of art, my answer to this question has completely reversed. I now can tell you that I believe that a paintbrush is art.The reason being, because I believe that the creator of the paintbrush had a conscious thought of using his skills and imagination in the making of the paintbrush. The paintbrush has many uses, one being to create beautiful pieces of art, and another of being of piece of art itself. In my eyes I believe that the creator of the paintbrush both made the paintbrush aesthetically pleasing and useful.

In David Hume's Essays, Moral and Political, 1742, he says:

"Beauty in things exists merely in the mind which contemplates them."

How true this is with art. The beauty to the art piece is in the eyes of the creator. I believe that even art that I may consider ugly, was created (with the intention of  the creator) as beautiful. This can easily be compared to an ugly baby. As the outside person you see the baby as ugly, but if you were to ask the mother or the father of the child. They would assure you that the baby that you see as ugly is one of the most beautiful creatures they have ever seen.  

Their is a quote by Karl Lagerfeld that states:

"I don't like standard beauty - there is no beauty without strangeness."

 This quote is a prime example of beauty to some (standard beauty) is not the same as to others( beauty with strangeness). Thus, people definitions of both beauty and art are,  exactly that, that definitions.

After researching the question, What is Art? I have finally come to my conclusion of what art is. Art is the intention of the artist to produce something using their talents and abilities that is magnificent in their eyes. Therefore, even things like chairs, plates, houses, cars, and refrigerators can be art. It all begins with the creators intent on the object of their creation.